Loss of Muscle :-(

emmaleighjohnson

Pink and Fluffy Poster
Along with measuring my body and my weight I've been using my body fat scales.

Things have been going really well i.e. muscle and water increasing and body fat decreasing. However (this week) my body fat has crept up by 1.1% and my muscle and water have gone down.

This is really worrying me because I don't want to lose weight I want to lose fat!!

I did a google to find out the best way to increase muscle and it talked about doing cardio (I cycle daily and I run three to four times per week). I am so worried and annoyed. :cry:

I am on 810 by the way and this body fat increase has arrived as I started 810, it was all body fat loss on SS.
 
Emma, you're beautiful the way you are!! Don't worry about what the scales say - you are not fat. These are only a guide. If you analyse every fluctuation you will drive yourself mad.
 
Emma hunni, you can't possibly have put on fat on the 810 plan, honest. You have to remember that these are percentages so if you have lost water weight the fat would be a greater percentage of the total. Do your scales tell you how much fat, water and muscle in lbs or kgs that would be more accurate for you to judge. I hope that makes sense but I know what I am trying to say.

I believe you can lose some muscle towards the end of your diet which is why we need to move up the plans.
 
I did a google to find out the best way to increase muscle and it talked about doing cardio

You can't actually increase muscle when you are on a diet. Well, not on a calorie deficit diet. It's impossible.

You can tone it making it more efficient.

I shouldn't worry about the bodyfat scales, they are a fun guideline, but not terribly accurate.

With any weightloss diet you will lose a little muscle, but a ketogenic one like Cambridge will preserve it better than most :)

You're doing fab. Don't stress;)
 
I have no scientific basis for this, but I think I may be losing a small bit of muscle because I have less fat to haul around! What do you think?

Dee x
 
I have no scientific basis for this, but I think I may be losing a small bit of muscle because I have less fat to haul around! What do you think?

There might be something in that, but it's a little more complex.

To lose a pound, you have to make a calorie deficit of 3,500. That's not to say you'll lose a pound of fat, just a pound of body weight. You'll burn mainly fat, but also some lean body mass.

How much depends on a few factors such as how much body fat you have in the first place, (the more fat you have, the more fat you lose), how much protein you have, how many calories you take in a day.

The 3,500 calorie deficit to burn a pound of bodyweight is an estimate. If you burnt 3,500 cals in fat alone if would be 1lb lost, but if you burnt 3,500 calories in muscle alone, you'd probably lose about 5-6 pounds in bodyweight. Of course, you wouldn't want to lose 5-6 pounds of muscle as muscle burns more calories than fat, so the more muscle you have the better in terms of metobolic advantage, in other words, more muscle you have, the faster your metabolic rate is and the more you can eat without gaining.

To build muscle, you have to eat more than maintenance calories. You have to make and excess in calories whereas a weight reducing diet must have a calorie deficit.

What you can do though is help to protect your lean mass through exercise and a diet that is higher in protein such as Cambridge.

You will still lose some muscle, just not so much.

Hope that makes sense :D
 
That makes loads of sense, and is very interesting. Thanks KD

x
 
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